bio - trying to wean him off in case its reason for not getting enough milk/low weight gain

i just know it does but this weaning off the nipple shield is excrutiatingly painful. He has a good mouthful when he latches and may suck for a good 5 min and then starts trying to pull off with my stuff still in his mouth. he did it just while ago at least 5-6 times in less than a minutes time. I say weaning...i haavent used it in a few days so it was more cold turkey. also when he's 'feeding' he keeps chomping down with his gums and that hurts terribly too. theres a few moments i can tell he's content, it just doesnt last for long. i look foward to nursing him first thing when i get home from work and it being all nice and beautiful but this is a far cry from it. and when he gets frustrated i cant help but want to give him my milk in other ways. i just want the process to hurry up and heal so its something weboth can look forward to. i cant judge how well he's feeding as far as itake naturally vs the shield...but hes definitelly hooked on that thing. i gave 7 feedings yesterday w/out giving him pumped milk and the last one i stopped and gave him bottle. but this morning was not something i want to continue....and it hurts for my shirt to touch the girls much less holding the baby or dh/landon running up for hugs and i dont want to feel miserable at work. please tell me it wont take long. lol

I had to use a nipple shield with DS. I had a flat nipple on one side, but DS liked the shield better than bare breast (easier to latch onto perhaps?) so soon he refused to latch on to the bare breast even on my non-flat side. We used the shield for about 3 weeks, then I started weaning him of it. It took another month to really wean him off it totally. So he was nearly 2 months old before I really felt comfortable and confident nursing him. I had really really sore nips for about 2.5 to 3 weeks during the weaning process. I had similar problems with DS latching on too tightly and also trying to pull away while still latched on. One thing that I found that helped was to let DS nurse initially with the shield on or pump for a few minutes first (I have a strong let-down and that was causing DS to jerk away with my boob still in his mouth - apparently the let-down was not as strong through the shield as is was off the bare breast), then when he was relaxed I'd try him on the bare breast. I also started nursing him more often than he really needed, so that he wasn't hungry and sucking super strongly at the breast - he was just really getting more of a snack and as a result, he was more relaxed at the breast. I rarely wore a shirt - walked around the house topless because I couldn't handle the feeling of anything against my breasts. I couldn't even stand the feeling of the water from the shower on them, even after slathering them up with Lansinoh. I think all of the toplessness also helped DS get used to the bare breast - I let him sleep against my bare breast between feedings. I also decided to hold off of introducing any other artificial nipples (bottles or pacifiers) until after we were successfully weaned, so he didn't get his first artificial nipples until he was 8 weeks old. The only down side to that was that he refused to take the artificial nipples by then and never did take a bottle! But, at least we went on the successfully breastfeed until DS self-weaned at 27 months.

So, you're in the trenches now, but there are good times ahead. Keep telling yourself that you can do this and you will be successful. GL!

my only issue with refusing the artificial nipples/bottles is I have to work full time and can not 'drop' the job so to say. I know without a doubt it would help. I don't want to work but financiallyin a situation where we both have to to make ends meet.